Well,its lonesome in this ol' town

For those of you that aren't Dean Martin aficionados,that is the first line to his song "Houston"(see bottom of post) and it is pretty appropriate after two games for the Pirates against the red hot Astros.

On Monday,the Pirates lost a close one,3-2.
Ian Snell was the loser (6-11) in a game that featured all the runs in consecutive at bats-3 Houston runs in the bottom of the fifth and 2 Pittsburgh runs in the sixth.
Snell still seems to be at least approaching a turn around as he allowed just six hits and fanned nine Astros over six innings.
RBI singles to Adam LaRoche and Brandon Moss were the big Bucco hits.

Last night was hardly worth writing about.
The Pirates jumped on Houston's Randy Wold for two runs early on a Ryan Doumit single and Adam LaRoche double and was unable to dent Wolf thereafter until Steve Pearce hit his first homer of his career in the seventh.
In between was nine Houston runs,double digit hits,a few Pirate pitchers and you get the pull of the surf here in a 9-3 Houston win.
About the only thing this game will be remembered for was the first use of instant replay that involved the Pirates as Hunter Pence's sixth inning double was looked at to determine if it was a homer or not (it wasn't).
Gee,what memories!
Ross Ohlendorf allowed six runs in four innings in moving to 0-1.

Five Thoughts

One: Nice to see Steve Pearce finally hammer home run number one.
Especially after this was in the Post-Gazette on the day of the game!

Two: More Pearce.
I know I keep going to the whip on this one,but he needs to play more!

Three: Related to Pearce
I will be damned if I can figure out what Pearce has done to dip in the eyes of management.
His year at Indianapolis wasn't great,but not putrid and why he sits for Nyjer Morgan is a riddle made for Edward Nigma.

Four:
I will also scratch my head over how two management teams and some fans seem to be infatuated with Nyjer Morgan.
The guy has one tool (speed) and he doesn't seem to use that right.
That can be seen with the way he constantly overslides bases with his head first dive and gets tagged out.

Five:
I have only seen Ross Ohlendorf twice,so this is way too soon to form a definite opinion,but he strikes me as more of a bullpen type eventually.
Not as a garbage time type,but with his arm-a setup and closer perhaps.

Pitching Matchup

Pittsburgh:Tom Gorzelanny (6-9 6.64 ERA) at Houston:Brian Moehler (10-6 4.22 ERA) 8:05

Bullpen Notes

The Post-Gazette is reporting that the Pirates are looking at moving from Lynchburg and Hickory and the new SAL team could be (wait for it) (wait for it)-
West Virginia!
We suspected and wrote this a week ago!
Still not convinced of a Lynchburg move unless the Hillcats want Pittsburgh out or the Bucs have a backup plan.
As I was once told by a smart baseball man-"No one leaves the Carolina League voluntarily".

I might have mentioned it before,but the Giants dedicated a statue outside their park to Orlando Cepeda.
Look for a Cepeda forgotten superstar post down the road.

The Giants plan to eventually have statues for each of their Hall of Famers and the Giants TV crew said the next statue being planned is for Gaylord Perry.

The Seattle Seahawks needed to make a few moves and they made them swiftly.
Star defensive tackle Rocky Bernard and nickel back Jordan Babineaux needed to be placed on the roster from one game suspensions and Nate Burleson was officially declared out for the season and placed on the IR.
Once placed on the IR,it is a permanent spot for the year.
To make space ,wide receiver Jordan Kent and running back Justin Forsett were released,with the hopes that they would clear waivers and be eligible for placement on the practice squad.
Forsett may not make it through after an impressive pre-season,while Kent had chances against Buffalo to impress,but dropped two passes.
Seattle also waived punter Ryan Plackemeier in favor of former Packer Jon Ryan.
Ryan is from the area (Redmond) and averaged 44 yards per boot in two seasons in Green Bay.

Seattle still had one spot on the roster with the loss of Burleson and filled it with well traveled veteran Billy McMillan.
The Virginia product grabbed 23 passes for Minnesota in 2006,but spent last season out of football.
The Hawks may not be finished yet as even with the addition of McMillan,there is only 3 receivers on the roster.

The Cleveland Browns added Paul Hubbard to their practice squad after clearing waivers.
You may remember Hubbard as being such a must have for Phil Savage that he traded a fifth round pick in next years draft to pick Hubbard in Round six.

The Browns released running back Omar Cuff from the practice squad and signed former Oklahoma Sooner Allen Patrick.
Patrick was the last player cut by the Baltimore Ravens at the deadline.
I like what Patrick could potentially do and is well worth taking a free look.

SiriusXM announced their "Best of" packages that are supposed to entice the opposite brands owner to be interested in adding for four dollars a month.
Honestly from the XM side,looking at these-I would only want the NFL channel and I am not sure that makes me want to add the upgrade.



Photo Credits
Morgan:AP Photo
Patrick:AllenPatrick.org